The journey to elite ninjahood
by madrampager
Summary: after comming back to Konoha from their mission to bring back Sasuke, Shikamaru driven by his urge to execute his missions perfectly goes training and develops a new stunningly powerful jutsu. Neji, after recovering took the chunin exams along with Hinata
1. Shika's training

**The journey to elite ninjahood**

Alright this is my first story and hopefully not my last.. haha anyway..i might as well be straight up with all of you.this story ain't gona have any romance in it..no pairing of characters..well mayb a little..we'll see how the story progresses shall we? P alrite..this story happens just after Naruto left to train with Jiraya for three years. Neji, Hinata, Shino, Rock Lee and Kiba go through the Chunin exams once again to become Chunins and take the Jounin exams with Shikamaru. The first part will be on the Chunin exams and the next part will be on their journey to attaining Jounin status. Hope u all enjoy..

While Chouji and Neji and Kiba along with Akamaru were still in the hospital, Shikamaru driven by his urge to be stronger and execute his missions perfectly, went training with his father. Upon reaching the training grounds, Shikamaru, being Shikamaru lay on the floor and started to look at the clouds and started thinking "Gosh all this training to be stronger is going to be so troublesome.. if I had known better I would have not taken that bloody Chuunin exam.. heh.. well now that im a Chuunin I guess I just have to train harder so none of my friends will die during dangerous missions.. ARRGH! How troublesome!" he thought sitting up. Just as he sat up, a shadow appeared around him and steadily got larger he looked up and saw a huge boulder falling towards him from above.

Quickly jumping out of its way he stood there looking around. His father was no where to be seen. He took a few steps back to try and recollect his thoughts but suddenly felt his ankle catch on to a wire that was so well hidden that he did not even see it even though it was right behind him.

"This is bad!" he said to himself as the wire gave way and a huge tree trunk swung towards him. He jumped and landed on the trunk only to find an explosive tag on it being lighted. He quickly jumped off the trunk and landed on a nearby tree hiding in the shadows only seconds before the explosive tag on the tree trunk exploded. "Amazing!" He thought to himself "While I was there day dreaming my father actually managed to set up so many traps, some of which were so near to me and I didn't even know. He even predicted what I would do and set the traps according to it. So that's where I got my intelligence from.

But I bet he didn't predict that I would jump onto this.." just as he was thinking that, he turned to his right and saw a note stuck to the tree trunk ."Shikamaru, your objective today is to get past this trap field and locate me. Once you have found me, we will battle, and if you are able to trap me with any of your shadow techniques, I will teach you a new Jutsu from the Nara clan, i will teach you the Nara clan's Kuchiyose no jutsu, i will teach you to summon the shadow lord ." Read the note which was signed by his father. "So much for not guessing I would not jump here." He sighed.

Shikamaru jumped off the tree and was about to land on a thick patch of grass when he saw a glint of metal on the ground "SPIKES!" he shouted at himself mentally and quickly leaned forward, used his hands to push the ground just in front of the spikes and flipped over the spikes landing on his feet. Right in front of him was a note reading "Be more careful Shikamaru, almost got you!" "WHAT! He actually knew I would do that!" thought Shikamaru "this is bad, I got to think about it and devise a strategy" he sat down and put his hands together but just as he did that, another tree trunk came flying towards him.

He dodged it and jumped to yet another tree but only to see an explosive tag being lighted as he touched the tree. "DAMN!" he thought as he jumped off the tree and landed in a tall patch of grass. "I cant stay in one place and think or the traps will still be set off!" he thought to himself as he ran across the field making sure to keep low so that he may spot any traps that are planted on the ground.

He was running when suddenly his arm caught another well hidden string and soon he saw 8 kunais flying towards him from all directions. "what the!" He thought as he jumped, trying to dodge the kunais "I've been focusing so much on the ground that I failed to notice that trap, I have to be more cautious when looking for traps now." Suddenly all the kunais were diverted and came flying towards Shikamaru who was still in mid air. His mind worked quickly and he immediately took out 4 kunais from his kunai pouch, placing two in each hand threw them at 4 of the kunais that were flying towards him.

The kunais that he threw caused 4 of the kunais that were flying towards him to deflect further upwards and hit each other at such an angle that they were deflected back down and caught the other 4 kunais aimed at Shikamaru at that small ring at the end of each kunai resulting all 8 of the kunais to be pinned to the ground. As Shikamaru was about to land, his saw 8 stones surrounding the area that he had set the traps off. "So that's how the kunais deflected upwards, my father knew that I would jump away so he used those rocks to divert the kunais upwards towards me."

"PSSSFFFT!" explosive tags planted on the rocks around him lit up while he was still in mid air. "ARRGH! Does my father have no end of explosive tags? What is he trying to do kill me!" Shikamaru grumbled to himself as he quickly jumped off one of the rocks and ran towards two nearby trees for shelter and to catch his breath. On that tree was another note "See? I already injured u with that trap." Read the note..

"wait a minute.. im not injured." Thought Shikamaru "He didn't expect me to dodge that trap perfectly. This means that I have the upper hand now cos he doesn't totally know what im going to do."

Meanwhile, Shikamaru's father who was hiding in the trees saw everything. "What! He managed to dodge that trap perfectly, I know of some jounins that are unable to dodge that trap! My son is more skillful than I thought."

Alright! That's it for now. Will post more later. Please feel free to review this story. If you guys don't like the story, I may not continue so yea! Haha.


	2. Trapping Nara Shukaku

Shikamaru crouched on the tree catching his breath and planning his next move. Being Shikamaru, he squatted down and started to think but his father on saw him and flung three kunais at him. Shikamaru sensing that something was wrong opened his eyes only to see the kunais flying at him at a very fast pace.

"not again!" he thought as he jumped and dodged the kunais.

"My father's really not letting me form a plan. I'm going to have to think as I dodge and make my way across this damned trap field."

As he was in the air, he saw a dark figure standing in front of some trees directly across where he was in the field.

"My father!" he thought and was just about to make his way across the field, planning to hide in the tall grass as he went.

"Wait a minute!" he thought as he stopped himself from jumping off the tree "That's exactly what my father wants me to do...but if I go through a totally unexpected route, my father will be taken by surprise and I will have the advantage in battle!"

With that thought, he jumped a few trees to his right and prepared for his next move. He prepared 2 kunais in his hand and with a sudden leap from the tree, charged towards the figure in front of the trees.

"What is Shikamaru doing charging at me head on like this? Its so unlike him!" his father thought as he saw what was happening.

Shikamaru charged towards his father and was just about to throw his kunai at him when he caught sight of three small flames being set alight in the tall grass. He knew immediately what they were, explosive tags.

"Oh no! When will this madness ever end!" he thought as he scanned his mind for the possible types of traps that this particular one might be.

"There are too many possible types! arrgh! So troublesome! If it's a wire triggered trap I'd be dead in the next few steps. Well if I can't be sure of the kind of trap I'll just have to get rid of the trap."

With that thought he took out 1 more kunai and flung all three of them at the three explosive tags, after which he wrapped his own explosive tag around yet another kunai and after wrapping an explosive tag around it, flung it at the ground to get rid of any tags and kunais that may have been set for him and making sure he was just out of the blast radius.

It worked according to his plan, Shikamaru was now hidden in the smoke caused by the explosion and the three kunais that he threw at the explosive tags had impaled them and were now flying towards his father still lit.

The kunais hit their target and exploded but when the dust cleared, Shikamaru's father was nowhere in sight. Shikamaru simply smirked, walked to the center of the three trees, tied an explosive tag around a kunai and flung it into the air.

"my father is not the only one with a lot of explosive tags" Shikamaru smirked as he thought back on all the explosive tags that were used by both him and his father during this training session. "He'd better reimburse me for them though.. they're expensive he thought rather gingerly."

The kunai exploded in the air and Shikamaru noticed a figure crouching on a thick branch in the middle tree. He took out three shurikens and was about to throw it at the figure in the trees but at the last moment, he flicked his wrist and threw the shurikens at such an angle that it went around the tree on the right, spun around it three times and impaled itself in the bark of the tree trunk.

Shikamaru walked to the back of the tree on the right to see, just as he had planned his father trapped by the metal wires that he had tied to his shurikens.

"Kage Manin No jutsu." Shikamaru said and trapped his already trapped father in his jutsu.

"Very good my son, but how did you know that I was behind the tree?"

"When I flung the kunai with the explosive tag on the floor while I was charging at you, the blast of the explosion created wind that already revealed your bunshin in the trees. I was not sure if it was the real you however as I saw a further shadow trailing down into the ground where you were supposed to be standing. That's why I threw the kunai up into the air. By the light caused by the explosion, I saw a small trail of shadow leading to behind the tree on the right. It's the weakness of using shadow Jutsus; there is always a trail no matter how slight."

"so you figured it out" said his father in an impressed tone. " looks like intelligence runs in our family"

A reluctant look overtook Shukaku as he sighed and said "very well as promised I will teach you to summon the Shadow Lord starting tomorrow. But be warned, should you fail to master this summoning, it will cost you your life. Are you sure you want to learn it?"

"Dammit! This is so troublesome!" mumbled Shikamaru in frustration. He thought for awhile and gave a heavy sigh, "if this will help me complete my missions better then teach me."

Ok that's it for now.. will update more soon..once i get the time of course.. since i started work time is a scarce thing..


	3. summoning the shadow lord

hrm i wonder if anyone reads these stories.. anyway.. here's the third installment of the series..

When they got back home shukaku told Shikamaru "the reason why i gave you the test today and didnt let you stay at one lace and think is simply because during a mission or a battle you will have to think on the move, you cannot stand at one place, you're sure to get killed. Remember that. Tomorrow i will bring you to the training grounds and teach you how to summon the shadow lord but for now get some rest. its gona be a long day for you tomorrow."

The next day, Shikamaru and his father went to the training grounds and as promised, Shikamaru's father started to teach him the Nara Family summon, the shadow lord.

"alright listen up Shikamaru, the process of summoning the shadow lord is extremely easy, all you have to do is use your blood and write the character for shadow on you hand and call forth the shadow lord.. it is the taming of the shadow lord that is the hard part"

"alright already.. just show me how.. this is such a bother" grumbled shikamaru

"the shadow lord is an extremely intelligent summon and will only obey you if you gain its respect.. that is the hard part"

"so how am i supposed to gain its respect?" inquired shikamaru

"that you have to find out yourself baka! im not supposed to tell you.. that's the nara tradition of summoning the shadow lord" his father said as he smacked shikamaru across the back of his head

upon saying that, Shikamaru's father bit and writing the character "shadow" on his palm with his blood he pressed it to the ground yelled "Kuchiyose no jutsu!". Almost immediately a dark figure seemed to appear from the depths of Shukaku's shadow.. growing at a constant pace until it was about 24 feet tall, four times the height of shukaku and stepped out from his shadow. the figure was totally black had two long katanas attached to its back in a crossed pattern and had a belt made up of skulls. on its head it wore what looked like the head of a stag with a full array of horns.

"its been a long time shukaku." said the figure in a tremendously booming voice as it bowed. "what can i do for you?"

shukaku bowed in return, respect was obviously observed between both parties. "its time to teach my son shikamaru how to summon you."

after giving shikamaru a brief glance, the shadow lord replied skeptically. " humpf! he doesn't seem very strong shukaku. are you sure he's ready to face me? remember the first time you tried to learn to summon me? Weren't you almost killed? and you were older then him too.."

"i believe he is ready" retorted shukaku. "he's the smartest person the nara clan has produced so far, and if i was able to subdue you in fifteen minutes after 3 tries, i believe shikamaru can subdue you on his first try."

"we'll see about that" said the shadow lord seemingly half amused. "remember shukaku as an agreement between your clan and me, you cannot tell your son anything about how to defeat me or how i attack. only the worthy get to summon me." turning to shikamaru, he boomed. " hey boy whats your name? and are you ready?"

"its shikamaru and can we get this troublesome ordeal over with already?" sighed shikamaru.

"such insolence!" boomed the shadow lord. "i'll make you kneel before me before the day is over. in order to summon me, you will have to defeat me in battle and make me submit to you boy. if you don't you will die."

shikamaru's eyes flashed red, if there's one thing he hated more then troublesome things, it was being called boy. it was just always too troublesome to retort.

"here i come!" yelled the shadow lord and with that disappeared into a nearby shadow almost instantly.

Shikamaru stood there stunned.. he had absolutely no idea what was happening and how the shadow lord was going to attack. he crouched low, facing the sun and started to think and tried not to be notice. suddenly, he felt a sharp pain in his shoulder, as though a katana had sliced him right trough his back. immediately he turning around prepared to fight, but instead he saw nothing. bleeding from his back, shikamaru immediately took part of his shirt and bound up the wound muttering something about how troublesome this whole thing was and how he should have failed the academy on purpose. he was just about done when he realized someone standing behind him, taking a kunai he turned around and was about to slash the figure when he realised that it was Chouji and stopped.

"what are you doing here!" he asked frantically. "its not safe, its very -" just then he noticed that Chouji was standing directly on his shadow and realised that chouji was actually coming out of his own shadow.

Before he could react, chouji stabbed him with a kunai aimed directly at his heart. Shikamaru just barely managed to dodge the fatal attack and was hit just below his heart. "so you attack by coming out of people's shadows! but how did you know about Chouji!" demanded shikamaru as he fell to the floor clutching his wound

"foolish boy, its your shadow i came out from, because your shadow is part of you i know all about what you know by merging with your shadow and coming out of it. in your clan's shadow binding jutsu, if you control the shadow you control the person i am the lord of all shadows, by interacting with your shadow i know all about you and what you know." laughed the shadow lord, a menacing laugh.

"i now know alot about you shikamaru. like this." said the shadow lord as he slowly transformed into a giant centipede. "i know of your worst fears, you were bitten by a large centipede when you were young and taken to the hospital where you stayed for a good 3 days didn't you? you now have a huge fear of centipedes."

Shikamaru was paralysed with fear. clutching his wound and backing up against a tree, he could only stare helplessly as the centipede reeled back and was about to strike him and kill him.

"its the end" thought shikamaru. "Chouji my friend, don't ever let people look down on you." he thought as the image of chouji flashed across his mind "you are actually stronger then what they all could ever imagine." one by one the faces of Shikamaru's friends and team-mates flashed across his mind. team mates that he promised that he would train hard for so that they would never have to be hurt again it then occurred to him that he would never be able to fulfill his promise. that was enough to spur him into action.

he forced himself to fight the fear he had of the huge centipede and rolled out of the way just as the centipede struck. He then forced himself into a crouched position and using the seal he was all too familiar with, yelled "Kagemane no Jutsu!" and caught the large centipede in his jutsu.

"What!" yelled the shadow lord who was still in the centipede form as it tried to fight to control its movements.

"i figured it out." smirked shikamaru "you have two forms, one is a shadow form where you blend and travel from shadow to shadow, the other where you materialize and have your own shadow. thats when i can catch you in a jutsu"

"no matter!" scowled the shadow lord "im alot stronger then you and can use brute force to break the jutsu" and with that started to fight the jutsu with his strength

Shikamaru realising that he couldnt hold on much longer made a move out of desperation. he lunged foreward and the shadow lord in centipede form was forced to lunge foreward just as it was able to break the shikamaru's hold on it.

a loud crash followed and the shadow lord smashed into the large tree that shikamaru had only moments before rested against paralysed from fear.

shikamaru quickly used his forehead protector as a make shift bandage and bound up his wound and started running away from the sun. the shadow lord reeled in pain as it recovered from the huge knock that it had recieved. it then returned to its shadow form and started to attack shikamaru by popping up in front of him and trying to slash him with its katanas. shikamaru, though greatly weakened by his wounds was able to dodge the attacks. he then suddenly noticed that as the shadow lord materialised to hit him with its katanas, there was always a shadow of the hand and the katana.

"it can partially materialise as well!" shikamaru thought as he ran being sure to keep his shadow in front of him as he taunted the shadow lord everytime the shadow lord failed to hit him and noticed that in every consecutive attack, the shadow lord materialised a little more and that each consecutive attack got stronger. he then took out kunais and started to throw them at the shadow lord as it materialised. each kunai however missed the shadow lord completely as the shadow lord always went back into shadow form just before the kunai hit it.

suddenly, he stopped totally with his back facing the sun. the shadow lord quickly materialised in its full form so close to shikamaru that he would be unable to block its attack and was about to slash shikamaru. when it suddenly found that it was unable to move its hand or body.

"over here" said shikamaru as he made the shadow lord turn around.

"how did you - " the shadow lord began

"i knew by the formalities that you and my father exchanged that you were very particular about manners so i purposely made you angry so that you would totally materialise because the more you materialise, the stronger your physical attacks become. i made you angry with me so you would materialse totally to deal me a finishing blow. so as you were materialising when i stopped running i did a Kawarimi no jutsu and trapped you in my kage manin no jutsu. the shadow you came out from is from the tree trunk behind you."

"this kid is good" thought the shadow lord "no matter he will pay for his insolence!"

it broke shikamaru's hold on him and was about to revert to its shadow form again and blend into the shadow it came out from when shikamaru snapped his fingers and an explosive tag that was attached to the tree trunk caused it to explode injuring the shadow lord. the shadow lord for the first time looked around and realised that it was standing in the middle of a large open field with no other shadows to retreat into.

"baka!" shouted the shadow lord "i still have my own shadow to retreat into"

it was just about to revert back to his shadow form when shikamaru snapped his fingers again and this time, two huge explosions of light from the front and the back of the shadow lord caused his shadow to completely disappear.

"i know you have your own shadow, but did you really think the kunais that i threw at you were intended to hit you?" said shikamaru calmly "they were all attached to strings which carried many light bombs each. and when two sources of light of equal intensity shines on an object, there is no resulting shadow, which means no where for you to run" shikamaru then snapped his fingers as the light from the first two bombs started to fade

the shadow lord looked upwards and saw that all around the clearing were strings with many lightbombs attached to them. and it was somehow in the middle of all of them. such was the planning of shikamaru.

snap and again light bombs exploded, shikamaru then took the chance and moved behind the shadow lord, drawing one of its katanas and slashed at its back. snapping his fingers again to activate another pair of light bombs, he continued maneuvering around the shadow lord slashing away at its 24 foot frame.

the shadow lord, bleeding and getting more and more angry with each slash shikamaru gave it took out its remaining katana and started to fight shikamaru. taking the opportunity where shikamaru had to stop to snap his fingers, it knocked shikamaru to the ground and swung its katana at him. Shikamaru parried the attack and kicked the shadow lord.

the shadow lord stumbled backwards and was about to slash shikamaru again when shikamaru used the butt of the katana and smashed it against the shadow lord's nose. the shadow lord held on to its nose and reeled in pain as shikamaru snapped his hands again. this time only one light bomb exploded. the shadow lord still reeling from its pain noticed this and was about to revert to his shadow form. "Kage Kubi Shibari no Jutsu!" shikamaru said and the shadow lord felt hands creep up on it to its neck and it was unable to move or revert back to its form.

the hands slowly squeezed harder and harder, choking the shadow lord. the shadow lord, after being slashed so many times by shikamaru was too weak to fight back and slowly fell to its knees beginning to black out.

"i submit." the shadow lord conceded.

shikamaru released his jutsu and started to walk towards the shadow lord, half way towards him however, he fell to his knees clutching his wounds.

"shikamaru!" his father who had been watching from the sidelines all the while rushed over to his side and taking some ointment, quickly applied them to his wounds to begin the healing process.

the shadow lord got to his feet and walked over "you're good kid..its been a long time since anyone defeated me on their first try.. i'll concede you are the smartest the clan has ever produced. you were thinking ahead of me by at least 3 steps." said the shadow lord. "you knew that i would knock you to the ground when you snapped your fingers so you prepared to kick me and smash my nose with the sword. then you knew that the pain would cause me to be too distracted to notice the singular light bomb exploding until it was too late and you caught me in you jutsu. and finally you needed the shadow so that you could catch me in you jutsu."

shikamaru simply smiled. "i still dont know your name" said shikamaru weakly.

"my name is simply shadow. or kage" said the shadow lord.

"i apologise kage, for what i said, it was only to -"

"its alright kid" the shadow lord stopped shikamaru in mid sentence, it was a legitimate tactic. and with that he produced a large scroll. " i need your blood your handprint on this if you are going to summon me"

shikamaru did as he was told and the deal was sealed, he had become the next member of the Nara family to be able to summon the shadow lord.

"thank you for your time kage" said shukaku to the shadow lord.

the shadow lord bowed and disappeared into shikamaru's shadow as a sign that it had accepted shikamaru as someone worthy of summoning it.

"now get up and walk" said shukaku to shikamaru "if you think that im going to carry you home you are seriously mistaken."

"what a bother" shikamaru mumbled as he slowly got to his feet helped by his father. the both of them walked back home with shukaku supporting shikamaru.

ok thats all for now.. the next chapter will be on neji, and the rest taking their chuninin exams and possibly shikamaru developing that powerful new jutsu i was talking about! stay tuned!


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